I was just trying to fix a leaky roof on an ordinary afternoon, the kind of task you postpone for weeks until the drip finally becomes impossible to ignore. The ladder felt slightly unstable against the siding, the metal warm from the sun, and every step upward came with that familiar hesitation between caution and annoyance. I remember thinking how small the problem seemed from the ground—just a stain on the ceiling, just a bit of water after rain—but up close everything always looks more complicated.

The shingles were older than I liked to admit, brittle in places, soft in others, and scattered across them were the quiet signs of years of weather doing what weather always does. I had barely started inspecting the source of the leak when something near the edge of the roof caught my attention. At first it was nothing more than a distortion in shape, a kind of uneven shadow where everything else was predictable lines and textures. But the longer I looked, the more it felt wrong in a way I couldn’t immediately explain. It didn’t belong there—not in color, not in form, not in the way it interrupted the pattern of dust and debris.